


how to get away with committing murder without committing murder

by exactlyemma



Series: happy(ish) paulkins [5]
Category: Hatchetfield Universe - Team StarKid
Genre: F/M, Kinda, Meet the Family, im joining the 'nightmare time references through dreams' party, listen i wrote one tiny chatfic with emma and alice and now im soft for them, so minor nightmare time spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-16 07:20:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28827315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/exactlyemma/pseuds/exactlyemma
Summary: "Babe, it's just dinner."They both knew it kind of wasn't just dinner. Paul hadn't imagined he'd be so nervous for his girlfriend to meet his niece, yet there he was, trying to find a way to reschedule their dinner for a fifth time. Preferably for a date that was a good ways away. He could do this, he could. The only person he needed to convince was himself.minor spoilers from nightmare time ep 2. they aren't treated as canon and don't affect the plot, but if you haven't seen 'forever and always' and plan on doing so this is your warning that you might get upset if you read this lol
Relationships: Paul Matthews/Emma Perkins
Series: happy(ish) paulkins [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2040001
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	how to get away with committing murder without committing murder

**Author's Note:**

> me: *uses the word lament*  
> me: hehe firebringer reference

Paul hadn’t imagined he’d be so nervous for his girlfriend to meet his niece. Emma had met his parents, despite her protests that had softened over a year. Paul met Tom and Tim, and eventually Becky. It also wasn’t like Emma hadn’t already met Alice. She heard Bill stories of daily work antics and college days all the time.

And yet, he’d put off the meeting of Emma and Alice for months. It could have had something to do with the fact that it was by Alice’s intervention that he had really talked to Emma in the first place. He worried that Alice had an invisible standard of Emma that she somehow wouldn’t live up to. There was also the fact that, in the year that they’d dated he’d learned quickly that Emma despised being manipulated, and that wasn’t exactly what Alice had done, but she was certainly a third party in a two-person relationship. Those were the main reasons his anxiety liked to list when Mr. Davidson scheduled a last minute meeting at the same time dinner was supposed to be and Paul found himself not really wanting to try and reschedule.

It was on their fourth attempt at rescheduling that Paul ran out of meetings and excuses. Paul was walking out the door, excited to go home and see Emma, forgetting about their plans. He made it as far as Bill’s desk.

“Hey, Paul?”

Paul kept his sigh internal and turned to face Bill, who was looking at him expectantly.

“We’re on for tonight, right?”

Paul ran his eyes over the calendar on Bill’s desk (he really had to remind himself to give Bill a lesson on google calendar, who still had a calendar at their desk?) and landed on that day, where he could make out the words ‘dinner’ and ‘latte hottay’. _Oh, shit_. How could he have been so careless to forget about dinner? He had really meant to put it off again.

“We are,” Paul said, his anxiety brain taking over. “I mean, um, I should talk to Emma, but I think we are, yeah. You’ll bring Alice?”

Bill narrowed his eyes at Paul. He had always been alarmingly good at reading him. “Yeah, she’s staying with me this weekend. That’s why we scheduled for tonight.”

“Right, yeah, of course, I knew that.” Paul twisted his keys in his hands.

“You’d tell me if something was wrong, wouldn’t you, Paul?” Bill’s expression was calm, and Paul was a little annoyed at how quickly he was able to read between the lines.

“Yes,” he said, teeth gritted. “We’ll meet you there.”

Bill smiled as Ted walked past. “Great. See you later, Paul.”

Paul waved over his shoulder as he left. “See you.”

Damn Bill. He knew that if he didn’t double check the date Paul could fall back on it as an excuse not to go. They both knew if he deleted it off their shared calendar that Emma would easily forget.

Emma did not forget.

“Babe, it’s just dinner. It’s not like we’re telling them that we’re robots, or something.”

Paul paused in putting down his bag. “That’s a weirdly specific analogy.”

She shrugged, taking her feet off the coffee table. “I had a weird dream last night.”

“Now I’m intrigued.”

“Well, you were like a clone, and I was a robot, and we killed our normal selves. It was weird. You were like the kid on Stranger Things, you had a little tattoo on your wrist and everything. You were the twenty-third Paul.”

Paul sat down next to her on the couch, enjoying the buzzing in his chest when she leaned into him. “Which Emma were you?”

“I was a _robot_ , dude,” Emma said, as if this were an excuse to not being numbered. “I dunno. I killed everyone at the Birdhouse, though, and I stole one of the dead people’s eyes.”

“You love that place,” Paul said, indignant for this nonexistent robot Emma.

Emma punched his side. “Exactly! That’s what I was thinking. Dream-robot-me was pissed as _fuck_. She burned it down, too.”

Paul nodded out of respect for poor dream-robot-Emma, having to burn down her favorite pub and kill everyone inside.

“Hey, maybe that should be, like, our game plan for tonight.” Emma drew him out of his head quickly with a gentle nudge. “Speaking of which, remind me to never let you get me off topic-rambling again, your eyes are glazing over.”

“I like it when you touch me.” It was a weak defense, and they both knew it, but Paul got off with nothing but a kiss and a muttered ‘dork’. “Hey, wait a minute, did you just say our game plan for you meeting my niece and kinda-father-figure should be to burn down the restaurant?”

Emma wrinkled her nose. “That is how it came out, isn’t it? I meant our game plan should be to not do that. Get through the night without burning anything down or committing murder.”

“Oh.” Paul relaxed in his seat. “That makes a lot more sense. It’s setting the bar a little lower than I’d like, but I’ll allow it.”

And that settled it. Paul knew Emma could definitely tell he was being a little more anxious than normal, but she knew better than to bring it up and potentially cause a breakdown, so she just held his hand a little more than normal, and didn’t reject his hugs, which were given when they left the house, when they reached the restaurant, and at every intersection they stopped at.

They wound up walking, something Emma lamented in her heels and Paul only reminded her the dress code wasn’t strict and she hadn’t really needed to wear them. In response, Emma muttered something about kids being too damn tall, and she needed to get a leg up somehow. That made Paul laugh, so he let it go, even when Emma stumbled and nearly caused him to trip by using him as a pillow.

It was strange with Emma, things that probably would have annoyed him with anyone else, when she did it, it made him smile.

“Be careful,” he said, righting Emma.

She only rolled her eyes and leaned into his side.

They made their way to the restaurant, “ _Anything but Beanies,_ ” Emma had said when asked if she had any preferences on where they met, and so, not-Beanies it was. The restaurant was perfectly nice, arranged by Bill, it was a fairly new arrival to Hatchetfield, and appeared to be well received. 

Paul could see Alice eagerly waving from the minute they stepped inside, and couldn’t hold back the smile he got at seeing his niece look so excited and happy. He led Emma over to the booth Bill and Alice were sitting at, worried slightly by the knot between Emma’s eyebrows. 

Bill and Alice got to their feet to greet Emma, Alice getting to her first.

“Hi,” she said, grinning and holding out a hand, which Emma shook, still squinting at Alice. “I’m Alice, we kinda met a while ago, I expect yearly compensation for helping you guys get together.”

Emma's eyes widened and she shook Alice’s hand with more enthusiasm. “That’s where I recognize you from. I was trying to figure out where I knew you from, and that’s it. Compensation’s on Paul, I’m not the one who couldn’t figure out how to ask a girl for her number after over a month.”

Alice turned her gaze on Paul, and he was terrified to find mischief in her eyes. It was in that moment that Paul realized two things. First, there was no universe in which Emma and Alice would not get along. Second, there was no universe in which they wouldn’t use it against him.

Paul introduced Emma to Bill to get Alice’s troubling gaze off of him. Emma offered a hand for Bill to shake, but Bill hugged her instead. Emma’s eyes widened as Bill wrapped his arms around her, and she patted his back until he let go.

“You’re the Emma I’ve heard so many wonderful things about.”

Emma directed her gaze elsewhere as she slid into the booth beside Paul. “I’m sure it wasn’t all good.”

“It was,” said Alice, sitting down across from Emma. “He fell pretty hard.”

Paul frowned. He’d have to remember to be more confidential about his love life in the future. 

Bill started up generic office talk in Paul’s silence as they ordered drinks, Emma joining in with her favorite stories of asshole customers. Bill was telling the exaggerated story of Ted’s latest disaster, which involved more alcohol than it should, when Paul remembered exactly what happened the day that Alice got him Emma’s number.

He must have gasped, because his three tablemates turn to him expectedly.

“I can’t believe you got out of it for a whole year,” he said, pointing at Alice, who raised her eyebrows.

“Gonna need you to be a little more specific.”

“Deb! I still haven’t met Deb!”

Emma looked between Alice and Paul, her straw between her lips. “Deb?”

Alice’s eyes narrowed slightly, and her chin was lifted as she said the words, daring Emma to be a homophobic ass. “My girlfriend.”

Emma nodded, unphased. “Oh, cool. I had a few girlfriends in Guatemala.”

Paul choked on his seltzer, and could only glare as Emma giggled next to him. By the time he recovered, all Paul had left in him was a pat on the shoulder and, “That’s nice, honey.”

Emma and Bill were smiling, and Alice was staring at Emma like she was her new favorite person.

“Guatemala?” she asked, sizing Emma up again.

“I lived in Guatemala for a few years after I graduated high school,” Emma explained with another shrug. “Backpacking, mostly.”

Alice sat back, eyes wide, muttering something that sounded like, “ _Woah_.”

Emma looked at Paul, eyebrows raised in a silent question. Paul nodded earnestly, giving her his best smile. _You’re doing great_. She nodded once and smiled softly in response, her smile growing when she looked back at Alice.

The rest of the evening passed in relative peace. Alice promised once again that Paul could meet Deb and they really were still together, she wasn’t lying to make him complicit. Paul silently noticed with pleasure that Emma resisted Bill’s hug less the second time around, and the smile she gave Alice when they left resembled her real smile more than it did her customer service smile, which was the smile she gave to new people or to those she disliked.

“Was that okay?” he asked, holding the door for Emma as they left.

“It was fine,” she said, unbothered, automatically picking up on the fact that Paul was asking about more than the meal quality. “Bill’s like what you described, Alice seems good.” She hip-checked him once he was walking by her side again. “I’m glad you have them. I’m glad they have you.”

A smile played on Paul’s lips. “Me too, Emma. Me too.”

Emma had been smiling since he’d seen her, so it came as a surprise to look to his side and find her no longer standing at his side.

“Shit.”

Paul turned to find a wide-eyed, frozen in her tracks Emma. He nudged her side. “What’s wrong, Em?”

Her eyes flicked towards him. “I just realized that you probably need to meet Professor Hidgens now. You said Bill’s a father-figure to you and he totally talks just like Professor Hidgens talks to me.” Emma put a hand over her face. “Oh, God. I just wanted to take biology, I didn’t mean to get adopted.”

Paul put an arm around her shoulder, laughing as he led her outside. “I think you’ll be okay, sweetheart. Besides, you can’t exactly be an orphan at thirty-three.”

Emma frowned, looking up from her hands. “I can totally be an orphan at thirty-three. It’s just not as big of a deal. You don’t stop being an orphan when you’re a legal adult, people just stop making shitty sappy movies about it.”

“I guess you’re right.” 

Emma’s hand found Paul’s as she smugly announced that she very much _was_ right, thank you very much. It was dark by the time they were walking back to his apartment. Paul was glad they’d already decided Emma would stay the night at his house, and now, hand in hand and listening to Emma talking about dinner as she skipped down the concrete sidewalk, slipping occasionally in her heels, Paul couldn’t imagine letting her go home alone to lay alone and cold in her bed. He felt a swell in his chest, the one that often showed up when Emma was around.

Dinner could have gone much worse, he reasoned. Emma and Alice appeared to have exchanged phone numbers, which Paul took as the main signal that they’d gotten along well.

Maybe Alice would get to be the flower girl at their wedding after all.

Paul quickly banished that thought, reminding himself that they were still figuring everything out and marriage was a fairly repulsive concept to the both of them. They probably wouldn’t get married simply so that Alice could be someone’s flower girl. Probably.

“I was really nervous for tonight.” Paul said the words when they were about halfway between streetlights. They were words better fitted to be spoken in darkness.

Emma squeezed his hand as they walked towards a brighter patch of the cracked Hatchetfield sidewalk. “I kinda figured. I didn’t wanna make you more nervous, though, and I figured you’d tell me if we had to bail or something. Do you feel okay?”

“Yeah. I do, I think.” He was pretty sure that he felt better. The tumbling in his stomach had stopped, his headache had gone away. He no longer felt a sheen of sweat on his forehead. From the anxiety, anyway. Invisible hills were more rampant on Hatchetfield streets than any of them cared to admit.

“Good.” Emma grabbed his chin and tilted it down, stopping them beneath a street light. “You’ll tell me if something is wrong, right? Even if you’re just nervous? So I don’t have to guess?”

“Yeah.” Paul exhaled a long breath. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, I… I don’t know.”

“You don’t have to apologize, Paul. It’s not all on you. I could have asked if I was more worried. I trust you, you know? That includes if you’re feeling weird, I trust you to tell me. You’re not exactly an open book, though, so I need some help. You don’t have to be sorry for that, or change it, or anything. It’s something we can both work on. Okay?”

It did sound a little more manageable when she put it that way. Paul squeezed her hand back. “Okay.”

Emma rose on the tips of her toes to press a gentle kiss to his lips. “Okay.” Her lips brushed against his when she spoke.

Paul kissed her again, relishing the feeling when she smiled into it, the feeling of her nose touching his when they parted. They finished their walk, arms getting more and more wrapped together the closer they got to home as Emma excitedly informed him that they’d met their goal of setting nothing on fire and committing no murder.

“How do you get away with murder?” she asked as Paul put his key in the door.

“I don’t know,” he said, twisting the doorknob and stepping inside.

Emma stepped inside, promptly throwing her heels to the floor. “By not committing murder!”

Paul frowned as he took off his and Emma’s jackets and put them in the closet. “I think that joke is a little too literal, Emma.”

She shrugged, laying across him on the couch. “You love it anyway.”

Paul sighed, ignoring the elbow of his personal blanket poking into his ribs. “I do.”

That was how they woke up the next morning, and Paul wouldn’t have changed it for the world.

**Author's Note:**

> listen bisexual emma is a hill i'm willing to die on. i also don't think emma would technically be thirty three yet bc timeline, but the twisted reference was too good to let it slip away, timeline be damned


End file.
